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I remember the first record I ever bought as if it were yesterday, 'I Feel Fine' by The Beatles. It cost 6/4d from Bruce & Chambers in Newark and I was about 6. Even at that young age, the bwwwwwwuuuummmmmwwwaaaaaannnnnngggggg intro really captured my imagination and thus began my never ending affair with buying records and later going to 100's of gigs. Over the next 6-7 years I'd buy singles by the bucket load by bands such as The Searchers, The Hollies, Simon Dupree, The Honeycombs and Keith West's single 'Grocer Jack' taken from 'A Teenage Opera' I used to play Telstar over and over again on the old Dansette. I haven't a clue what happened to them I haven't seen them for years and years. My younger brother never had quite the same taste in music and used to drive me mad with Tommy Steele's, 'Little White Bull' and Lonnie Donegans 'My Old Mans A Dustman', which used to lead to major arguments over what got played on our shared Record Player. As a teenager aged 13-14ish I was well into the 'Glam Rock' scene and thought The Sweet were superb. I quickly discovered that the glitter and make up was just a facade, as their self penned 'b' sides were far more rockier. I saw them play at Hammersmith in the late 70's circa the Love is Like Oxygen era. I've still got lots of singles by them, Slade, T Rex, Alice Cooper et al stashed away in the loft, but by the time I'd reached 15-16 ish I'd discovered bands such as Led Zeppelin, Deep Purple and Black Sabbath and albums were now the order of the day and I drifted away from the 'Glam Rock' scene. The summer of '75 aged 16 I discovered the music of Barclay James Harvest. It was a Saturday afternoon, June/July time. I was with a group of friends playing football and then listening to Alan Freeman's Saturday Rock Show on Radio 1, when,cue the dramatic music, "Dear Fluff can we have more Camel, PFM and Barclay James Harvest, he duly obliged with the live version of 'Medicine Man' taken from their latest album release, to say it made an impression on me is an understatement. I first saw BJH play live later that year at the Ipswich Gaumont when they toured the Time Honoured Ghosts album..
...Some of the concert programmes I've acquired over the years seeing BJH It would be fair to say that over the years BJH have attained a cult status and have a die hard following of fans. To find out more about the band, the fan club and the fans visit my FOBJH pages. There is a rather nice tribute for drummer Mel Pritchard, who sadly died in 2004, which can be found on Martin Treanor's website, well worth a visit. It would be fair to say I spent a lot of my youth going to see bands play, either the Ipswich Gaumont, Essex Uni or Braintree College. Other bands I saw during this era were Robin Trower, Split Enz, Be Bop Deluxe, The Stiff Tour with Ian Dury and Elvis Costello et al, Phil Manzanera and Judy Tzuke and if there wasn't a band playing there were always the Caroline Roadshows to go to. Radio Caroline introduced me to many new bands, I think the fact that they were broadcast from a boat moored off the Essex coast and the DJ's had to be smuggled on land to be at the roadshows added to the romance of it all, see Radio Caroline. Another former pirate station I sometimes tune into via the internet is Radio London, Mike Read plays some great music in the morning and is quite happy to play requests and read out e-mails, well worth a listen.
Above is a small selection of the many concert programmes I acquired going to gigs mainly at the Ipswich Gaumont during the mid to late 70's. The stand out gigs have to be, 10cc, they were at the top of their game on this tour, Thin Lizzy, with Phil Lynott on board they put on a truly memorable gig (see story below) and Black Sabbath supported by Van Halen, this was by far and away the loudest gig I ever went to. This Is A True Story...........Honest!! Thinking back to my youth and gigs at the Ipswich Gaumont, I can remember queuing for hours in the snow and freezing cold one Saturday in January for tickets to see Thin Lizzy circa the Live & Dangerous era. We were there for hours and a chap in his 60's ( probably dead now) was in front of us and sometimes made the odd comment about the cold weather and shared a light with us whenever we lit up. After 3-4 hours someone from the box office came out and announced there was only £6-00 tickets left ( how times change), he didn't bat an eyelid. 5-6 hours later, frozen stiff and out of fags we made the box office, inside the warm foyer there was 2 windows open for Lizzy and one for all other acts. The old boy in front in a broad Suffolk accent said "yew boyze cooing for Thin Lizzy?"..."yep" we replied "oooohh oi wornt to see Slim Whitman", we pi**ed ourselves, he'd stood out there for hours in the snow and could have walked straight in.................well that's Ipswich for you :-)))))))
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